Senate draft of new U.S. farm law boosts Southern crop supports

* Senate and House panels expected to vote on farm bill next
week

* Southerners objected to "shallow-loss" revenue program for
months

* Farm bill would cover crops from 2014-18

By Charles Abbott

WASHINGTON, May 9 In a concession to Southern
lawmakers, the new U.S. farm law would set sharply higher
support prices for rice and peanut crops under a draft prepared
for a Senate Agriculture Committee vote next week and released
on Thursday.

The $500 billion farm bill is seven months overdue. Senate
Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of
Michigan, called a meeting of her panel to consider the bill on
Tuesday. The House Agriculture Committee confirmed that it will
start its markup on Wednesday.

Stabenow's decision to continue the "target" price system -
although under a new name and with higher rice and peanut
supports - could resolve a major dispute over the program. In
2012 the Senate committee voted to replace almost all
traditional crop supports with a guarantee of crop revenue.

The text of the roughly 1,100-page Senate draft was posted
on the Internet on Thursday. Stabenow said her bill would cut
spending by $23 billion over 10 years, more than half of it in
crop supports. The House bill was expected to cut $36 billion,
with more than half it of from food stamps for the poor.

In the Senate draft, rice would get a target price of $13.30
per 100 lbs, up 26 percent from current law, and peanuts a
target price of $523.77 per ton, up 6 percent. Targets for other
major crops would be stay at current rates, well below current
market levels.

Farmers get federal payments when the average price for a
crop is below the trigger level set by the farm bill. The
Congressional Budget Office expects rice prices to exceed $14
per 100 lbs in coming years and peanut prices to average around
$500 a ton.

Target prices would provide a long-term floor for federal
support of grain, oilseed and cotton crops. The draft Senate
bill, like the 2012 version, would create an insurance-like
program to shield grain and soybean growers from the
year-to-year impact of poor yields and low prices.

Payments under the so-called shallow-loss program would be
triggered when a farmer's revenue from a crop was from 12
percent to 22 percent below a guaranteed level. The guarantee
would be based on an average of recent prices and would be
recalculated annually.

Sugar support prices would remain at current levels under
Stabenow's proposed five-year bill, while the dairy program
would be revamped into a margin-insurance format.

A $5 billion-a-year "direct payment" subsidy, paid
regardless of need, would be eliminated in the Senate bill - a
cost savings long sought by lawmakers.

"The era of direct payments is over," Stabenow said in a
statement touting the bill's deficit reduction goals.

"Passing the farm bill will yield a total of $23 billion in
cuts to agriculture programs," said Stabenow.

The bill would require farmers to practice soil and water
conservation to qualify for subsidized crop insurance policies,
said the Environmental Working Group, a pro-conservation group.

It also said the bill needlessly cuts conservation programs
in order to lavish more money on crop supports and crop
insurance subsidies.

The text was available here
(Reporting By Charles Abbott; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

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